The Vanished Messenger eBook

“Do you think,” Mr. Fentolin went on,
“that I spend a great fortune buying the secrets
of the world, that I live from day to day with the
risk of ignominious detection always hovering about
me—­do you think that I do this and am yet
unprepared to run the final risks of life and death?
Have you ever talked with a murderer, Mr. Dunster?
Has curiosity ever taken you within the walls of Sing
Sing? Have you sat within the cell of a doomed
man and felt the thrill of his touch, of his close
presence? Well, I will not ask you those questions.
I will simply tell you that you are talking to one
now.”

Mr. Dunster had forgotten his extinct cigar.
He found it difficult to remove his eyes from Mr.
Fentolin’s face. He was half fascinated,
half stirred with a vague, mysterious fear. Underneath
these wild words ran always that hard note of truth.

“You seem to be in earnest,” he muttered.

“I am,” Mr. Fentolin assured him quietly.
“I have more than once been instrumental in
bringing about the death of those who have crossed
my purposes. I plead guilty to the weakness of
Nero. Suffering and death are things of joy to
me. There!”

“I am not sure,” Mr. Dunster said slowly,
“that I ought not to wring your neck.”

Mr. Fentolin smiled. His chair receded an inch
or two. There was never a time when his expression
had seemed more seraphic.

“There is no emergency of that sort,”
he remarked, “for which I am not prepared.”

His little revolver gleamed for a minute beneath his
cuff. He backed his chair slowly and with wonderful
skill towards the door.

“We will fix the period of your probation, Mr.
Dunster, at—­say, twenty-four hours,”
he decided. “Please make yourself until
then entirely at home. My cook, my cellar, my
cigar cabinets, are at your disposal. If some
happy impulse,” he concluded, “should show
you the only reasonable course by dinnertime, it would
give me the utmost pleasure to have you join us at
that meal. I can promise you a cheque beneath
your plate which even you might think worth considering,
wine in your glass which kings might sigh for, cigars
by your side which even your Mr. Pierpont Morgan could
not buy. Au revoir!”

The door opened and closed. Mr. Dunster sat
staring into the open space like a man still a little
dazed.

CHAPTER XVIII

The beautiful but somewhat austere front of St. David’s
Hall seemed, in a sense, transformed, as Hamel and
his companion climbed the worn grey steps which led
on to the broad sweep of terrace. Evidently
visitors had recently arrived. A dark, rather
good-looking woman, with pleasant round face and a
ceaseless flow of conversation, was chattering away
to Mr. Fentolin. By her side stood another woman
who was a stranger to Hamel—­thin, still
elegant, with tired, worn face, and the shadow of
something in her eyes which reminded him at once of
Esther. She wore a large picture hat and carried
a little Pomeranian dog under her arm. In the
background, an insignificant-looking man with grey
side-whiskers and spectacles was beaming upon everybody.
Mr. Fentolin waved his hand and beckoned to Hamel and
Esther as they somewhat hesitatingly approached.